THE SUNDEW FAMILY. 28 1 



THE SUNDEW FAMILY (Droseracecz*}. 



A small group of exceedingly curious plants, which have 

 been termed " insectivorous," from their habit of entrapping 

 flies and other small insects. They are for the most part 

 delicate little herbaceous plants set with viscid glandular hairs, 

 and represented in our gardens by the Droseras of Europe, 

 Australia, and the Cape, the Portuguese Drosophyllum lusi- 

 tanicum, one of the very few plants having re volute vernation 

 (see * Bot. Mag.,'t. 5796). Dioncza muscipula is a pretty little 

 white-flowered plant, having flat expanded petioles and highly 

 sensitive leaves. All the plants are well worth culture, and 

 the British Drosera rotundifolia is a little gem when seen 

 luxuriating on living sphagnum moss in the cool Orchid-house, 

 each leaf being like an emerald set with a thousand little 

 rubies. 



Dionaea. A curious genus of irritable or fly-catching plants, 

 one species, >. muscipula, or " Venus's Fly-trap," having long 

 been grown as a curiosity in our gardens. This plant is a 

 native of N. America, and especially of the mossy swamps 

 of Carolina, and grows best in a cool moist atmosphere. 

 It is readily propagated in the spring. Shake out the 

 plant and remove the top or crown of leaves, which, in- 

 serted as a cutting in a close humid case, soon throws out 

 roots. Some propagators use a compost of sandy peat, leaf- 

 mould, and sphagnum for this plant, but the leafy tops will root 

 freely laid on a bed of living sphagnum moss in a close case. 

 The thick portion of the old stem, or root-stock, is covered by 

 the bases of old leaves, and this should be cut into small 

 pieces with a sharp knife or scissors, taking care to leave the 

 scaly base of a leaf or an eye to each portion, however small. 

 These pieces may be sown in a prepared cutting-pot like seeds, 

 and placed on a shelf in a cool airy house, and watered 

 occasionally to keep the soil moist. Every piece will grow, 

 and the young plants may then be potted in sandy peat and 

 living sphagnum, and will make a vigorous growth in a cool 

 frame or pit during the summer months plunged in living moss. 

 Seeds are freely produced on well-grown old specimens, and 

 vegetate freely sown in light soil in a cool frame or airy 

 greenhouse. This curious plant was introduced in 1768, and 

 is well figured in Darwin's ' Loves of the Plants,' and in the 

 'Botanical Magazine/ t. 785. 



*For a memoir on this order by M. Planchon, see 'Ann. Sc. Nat.,' 3 

 sen, ix. 79. 



